Tag: photographic journey

Photography Philosophy – Part VII – The Philosophy of Impermanence

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A moment you can’t get back

The second you name a moment, it’s already gone. Not the present any more, the past, and there’s no getting it back or repeating it. You can try to recreate it, same spot, same light, same people, but it will never be identical. Time’s already moved on to the next thing. Photography is the strange art of grabbing hold of that moment anyway, knowing full well it can’t be exactly reproduced.

So what do you do with that, as a photographer? Spend your time mourning everything that’s already slipped past, or feel lucky you managed to catch some of it on the way? I go back and forth. Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment is really just this idea dressed up in French. Like comedy, apparently, photography is mostly timing. Do you freeze the action with a fast shutter, or slow down and let some blur and motion into the frame? How fleeting is what you’re actually chasing, and what does a bit of movement add to it?

My own version of this

Over the years I’ve got better at noticing these moments and trying to hold onto them, especially with my kids, especially when they’re playing together and don’t know I’m watching. I want the mess and the spontaneity of it, not a posed version. Any parent will tell you the same thing: they grow up while you’re not looking properly, and then one day you are looking properly, at old photos, thinking where did that go. My son’s 25 now. My daughter’s 15. I still don’t quite believe either number.

Learning to live with mistakes

I’ll be honest, I don’t take to mistakes easily. I like precision, I like planning a shot properly, I don’t enjoy leaving things to chance, so when something goes wrong there’s a proper flash of frustration. A blurred frame, blown highlights, a moment I simply missed. Those are the things I try hardest to avoid, and mostly fail to avoid.

But looking back over what I’ve actually shot, the path to a photo I’m proud of was never a straight line. It’s trial and error the whole way, learning to see a scene not just through the lens but through everything I got wrong trying to shoot it the first time.

It’s usually the misfires that make me rethink what I’m doing, shift the frame, check the focus again. They show me an angle I wouldn’t have tried, or drag out a feeling I wasn’t expecting to capture at all. Each mistake teaches me something, even when I’d rather it hadn’t needed teaching. They’re not really setbacks. More like uncomfortable nudges toward seeing the same photograph with slightly fresher eyes.

The photo I end up keeping is almost never the first frame, or the second, or the third. It’s whatever’s left after a run of adjustments and false starts and moments of thinking this isn’t working. Take those out of the process and I’m not sure the image I actually wanted would ever have turned up.

So yes, I still want control. I’m not pretending otherwise. But I’ve come round to thinking there’s something in the unexpected too, the mistakes, the missed shots, the ones I got completely wrong. That’s as much a part of my photography as anything I planned properly, and it usually gets me closer to whatever it was I was actually trying to say with the picture.

Where that leaves me

Photography, when I strip away the gear talk and the technique, is really just an attempt to hold onto something that’s already leaving. Every photo I take is an admission that the moment won’t come back, and somehow that doesn’t feel morbid to me, it feels closer to the point. You’re documenting not only what you saw but roughly what it felt like to be the one holding the camera.

I still want the shot to be right. I still get annoyed when it isn’t. But I’ve stopped expecting the process to be tidy, because it never has been, not once, not for me. The mess is where most of the good ones come from anyway. If that’s the trade, catching a moment you can’t keep in exchange for never quite controlling how you catch it, I’ll take it. I don’t see another option, really, and thirty-odd years in I’ve stopped wanting one.

Also in this series: Part I — An Introduction  ·  Part II — Why Do We Photograph?  ·  Part III — The Emotions of Photography  ·  Part IV — The Art of Storytelling  ·  Part V — Identity & Self-Expression  ·  Part VI — Connection Through Photography  ·  Part VII — The Philosophy of Impermanence  ·  Conclusion

The Opening of the Film Archives—Clisson, September 2016

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Welcome back, Dear Reader, to the film archives, still with the Canon AE1 and HP5 Plus from Ilford, but in Clisson this time.  You will remember Clisson from previous articles and will have seen the pictures, so it shouldn’t be a stranger to you.  Who knows, it could even feel like revisiting an old friend.  It certainly is for me. 

But why Clisson I hear you say.  Well, it’s not very far away from where I live.  It’s also one of those market towns that is renowned for the beauty of its architecture with an Italian slant.  It has the massive castle that towers above the river.  It has me taking photographs of it.  

Clisson, like most things, has options.  On a Friday the main option is the huge market, and wandering around the 14th-century Halles, which can keep you out of the sun, the rain, the heat or the cold, depending on the time of year.  I either go down to the river and wander along the river banks in the Garenne and Lemot park, or park at the top of town and stroll around the Halles and surrounding streets.  In the series of photos at the end, you will see some stone steps that join the two options, but I have dodgy knees, and those steps are like leg day at the gym.  You can avoid those steps by just following the road that wraps itself around the church, and going under the tree that just got tired and decided to rest on the house opposite.  

But this time I decided to break out of my habits and visit the Quartier St Jacques with its decommissioned chapel, and garden.  It’s yet another pretty place in a pretty town, and when I was sitting there in the sun, I felt that I didn’t have a care in the world.  Serenity flooded my mind and all was well with the world…

The X100F, again!

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She’s My Pride and Joy

It seems that I’m not the only one who raves about this powerhouse of a camera. This just proves that size truly doesn’t matter. I’ve mentioned it on numerous occasions and I stand completely justified in doing so!

Here’s a selection of articles that I have written showcasing phtoography from this amazing little camera in no particular order:

What keeps me coming back to it isn’t really about the pictures, or not just the pictures. It’s small enough that I actually bring it places a bigger camera would stay in the bag for, and that alone means it’s taken photos that wouldn’t otherwise exist. Still my most-used camera by a distance.

Choosing the Right Film Format: 35mm vs. Medium Format Photography

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I shoot both 35mm and medium format, and people occasionally ask which one they should pick up first. Here’s my honest answer, with the two side by side so you can see the difference for yourself rather than take my word for it.

35mm is the format everyone starts with. It’s the standard: easy to find, easy to get developed, and every camera shop from here to Nantes has a fridge full of it. Medium format is a different animal entirely, and the differences show up the moment you hold a negative up to the light.

The most obvious one is detail. A medium format negative is so much bigger than a 35mm frame that it just holds more information, more texture, finer lines, without trying. If you want a print that rewards someone standing close up and looking hard, medium format gets you there faster.

Then there’s the shape of the thing. 35mm gives you the familiar 3:2 rectangle. A lot of medium format cameras, mine included, shoot square, 6×6. That square forces you to compose differently. You can’t lean on the usual rectangle instincts. Vivian Maier shot almost entirely on a TLR in square format, and it’s part of why her street work looks the way it does, different balance, different eye. I won’t pretend I’ve got her eye, but the square format does make you slow down and actually think about balance instead of defaulting to the rule of thirds out of habit.

Depth of field is shallower on medium format too, which is handy for portraits or any shot where you want the subject to properly separate from the background. Get the composition right and your subject sits there against a soft blur that 35mm makes you work much harder for.

Size and weight go the other way. 35mm cameras are small and light, which matters when you’re moving fast on the street. Medium format bodies, mine especially (see my Mamiya C220 review for exactly how much of a beast it is), are bulkier and heavier, and that changes how you shoot. Less grab-and-go, more plan-and-wait.

Cost is the other real difference. 35mm and its development are cheap. Medium format isn’t. Shoot 6×6 and you get twelve frames a roll, not thirty-six, which changes your relationship with the shutter button fast. If you get twitchy shooting 35mm, wait until you’re down to twelve frames and every one of them costs real money. That said, no shot is wasted, even the ones that don’t work teach you something, and if you’re after gallery prints or paid work, the extra cost of medium format tends to pay for itself in the result.

35mm also just moves faster in daily use, candid shots, quick reactions, film that’s easy to get processed anywhere. Medium format asks you to slow down and actually think through a shot before you take it, which some days I love and some days I find a proper faff.

Below is the same rough scene shot on both: a 35mm frame on the Pentax ME Super with a 50mm lens, and a medium format frame on the Mamiya C220 with an 80mm lens (roughly equivalent field of view). Have a look and decide for yourself which you prefer.

The 35mm frame, shot on the Pentax ME Super. The standard format, the one everyone knows.

The square 6×6 frame, shot on the Mamiya C220. Judge the difference for yourself.

Same rough field of view, 50mm on the 35mm body, 80mm on the medium format body, and you can already see how differently the square frame reads next to the rectangle.

If you want to go further into medium format, a Mamiya C220 review is coming, where I’ll go into what it’s actually like carrying that thing around Nantes for a day.

There’s no correct answer here, whatever the camera forums tell you. I use both, for different reasons, on different days. 35mm when I want to move fast and not think too hard. Medium format when I’ve got the time to plan a shot properly and want the negative to reward it. Pick whichever one matches how you actually like to work, not which one sounds more serious.